(BTW, for those who are wondering
- we will not be doing pre-orders for this show, but
we are packing up a competent supply. We hope.)

SLIGHTLY LESS NEW!!!!

In celebration of Sock Summit 2011, the Tsarina announces the latest monstrous creation of a decidedly Abby Normal brain:

Fronkenshteek may well be the
craziest development yet in the growing field of
modular and communal sock knitting. There is a reason
it was NOT chosen for the Fleece to Foot challenge at
the 2011 Sock Summit... but the boldest knitters
will not shrink from it. That's you, right? (Yes, it is. There are half a dozen KALs sprinkled all over Ravelry, including a big hilarious international one with teams swapping segments by mail. Also - watch this space for the Fronkenshteek video, coming soon to a YouTube near you.) Go find out.

The "Art for your Feet" Tsock Kits have been admired, knitted, and/or blogged by the Yarn Harlot, Lucy Neatby, Cat Bordhi, Sandi Wiseheart, and the Twist Collective. The designs are original and shamelessly over-the-top, stopping at nothing in the pursuit and enhancement of the theme or joke, form following function to its logical extreme and beyond. The kits are not necessarily for the faint of heart: with the one notable exception of our gentle and seductive "Tsocks 101" kit, every one of them presents exciting (and yes, occasionally maddening) challenges for the knitter. If you thought socks were all the same, if you thought they were dull and repetitive... think again. If you thought you'd seen it all where sock architecture and patterning are concerned... take a closer look. The Tsarina of Tsocks unhesitatingly invents new structures and stitches when she needs to - but never for their own sake; always in service and in scale to the all-important theme. These are socks that will keep you awake, stimulated and thinking; this is knitting on the edge of your seat.

Each kit contains a pattern booklet and enough of our custom-blend wool/silk sock yarn to make a pair of socks in Women's Medium or Large, depending on kit size (custom-size skeins and pattern modifications are also available - please don't hesitate to ask!), as well as all other materials that may be called for by the design (such as beads, buttons, ribbons, skeinlets of laceweight, etc.).
Some kits are also offered in Spin-Your Own versions - for these we supply the same blend of fiber, in the same colorway(s), but unspun. Some kits come in multiple colorways or "flavors."
Much of the yarn and fiber is dyed by Elizabeth Murphy of Moose Manor Handpaints, but we will often feature "special guest-artist" indie dyers for particular kits.

The booklets are 5.5" x 8.5", comb- or spiral-bound so you can use them like flip charts. They are copiously illustrated and include complete tutorials for every technique called for, as well as thorough explanations of the designs and themes; each is a theme-driven masterpiece, as well as a small master class in technique and fit. Pattern stitches are written out step by step but are also charted; you'll find the charts and a glossary of abbreviations on cards at the back of the book, so they can be removed and used separately if you like - placed on a chartkeeper, etc.

The Tsarina's special custom base yarn is a 4-ply blend of 70% superwash wool and 30% silk, spun to a high hosiery twist so it is both resilient and durable without sacrificing softness, and has beautiful stitch definition. The wool is grown and the yarn spun in the USA, to our exacting specifications.Typical gauge is 8 sts x 12 rows = 1" on US #1 needles.

A Tsampling of the Tsocks:
(Click on any thumbnail or title for details and photographs. Please note: Most of these are posts from my blog; a few are from my old web site, so they may contain obsolete information as to availability; this will all be updated in the course of 2011.
A complete listing of designs, with links to comparable pages, can be found on my design page on Ravelry)

An abbey! Yes, it was delightful to be really in an abbey! But she doubted, as she looked round the room, whether anything within her observation would have given her the consciousness. To an imagination which had hoped for the smallest divisions, and the heaviest stone-work, for painted glass, dirt, and cobwebs, the difference was very distressing.

The tender-hearted artichoke dressed in its armor, built its modest cupola and stood erect, impenetrable beneath a lamina of leaves, burnished to a pomegranate glow. And then one day, with all the other artichokes in willow baskets, our artichoke set out to market to realize its dream; life as a soldier....

Meet Marie, the adopted daughter and spoiled darling of the Magnificent Twenty-First; every inch the Napoleonic vivandiŤre, from her dainty little army boots to the brass buttons on her jaunty military jacket.

It can light a dark room with the brightness of its plumage. It kills deathless demons; it restores the dead to life. Capture the elusive Firebird; hold it fast until it promises to stand your friend. The journey will be long and the obstacles daunting, but the magical creature will bring you good fortune at last.

...thy father lies;Of his bones are coral
made.Those are pearls that were his
eyes;Nothing of him that doth fadeBut
doth suffer a sea-changeInto something rich
and strange.

Now - let's talk business, just you and me.
What are you, Jack Rance? A gambler. Johnson? A
bandit. Me? I own a bar and a gambling den, I
live off whiskey and gold. We're all the same!
All bandits and cardsharps. Well, then - hereís
my stake. Iím offering you this man - and my
life! One game of poker! If you win, you can
take him - and me. But if I win - on the honor
of Jack Rance, gentleman - then this man
is mine, MINE!

The man let the water trickle gently into his glass, and as the green clouded, a mist fell from his mind.
Then he drank opaline.
Green changed to white, emerald to an opal: nothing was changed.

But this you can't stand,So you throw up your hand,
And you find that you're cold as an icicle,
In your shirt and your socks(The black silk with gold clocks),
Crossing Salisbury Plain on a bicycle.

"You have
seen the puzzle of the Paper Ring? Where you
take a slip of paper, and join its ends
together, first twisting one, so as to join the
upper corner of one end to the lower corner of
the other? The Ring has only one surface, and
only one edge. The Sock is just like that, isn't
it? Is not the outer surface of one side of it
continuous with the inner surface of the other
side? Whatever is inside that Sock, is outside
it; and whatever is outside it, is inside
it!Ē

You know who I mean. Jazz-baby. Murderess. The beauty of the cell-block. That sweet-faced little flapper you want to take home to mother - after you bust her out of the clink. Yeah. That Roxie.

ďAre you still cold?Ē she asked. She bent and kissed his forehead with a kiss colder than ice, and the chill of it shot straight to his heart. Though his heart was ice already, her kiss made it colder still. For a moment he felt he might die of it. Then he felt better. After a while he didnít even know he was cold any more.

Not a sock knitter yet...? You WILL be assimilated, and this is how.

Just you watch. We'll make a sock pro of you yet.

Apollo, my destroyer, for you have destroyed me ... Have I missed the mark, or, like true archer, do I strike my quarry? Or am I prophet of lies, a babbler from door to door?

When I was young,
at my motherís breast -
Sing ho!
for the wind and the rain -
A vintage wine
was my sole request,
For the rain it rainíd
and rainíd evíry day....

And here I prophesy: this brawl today,
Grown to this factionin the Temple garden,
Shall send, between the Red Roseand the White,
A thousand souls to death and deadly night.